Louisville football loses talented RB to transfer and fans begin to worry

Louisville football loses an expected contributor at the running back position to transfer.

It’s been a very interesting couple of weeks around the Louisville football program for reasons both on and off the field. New head coach Scott Satterfield and his Louisville coaching staff have been on the job now for about three months and from everything that’s been said from the players to the coaches, things are moving forward in a positive way.

However, with every new coaching hire and change in “culture,” especially one of this magnitude, a turnover in players is usually expected. Leading up to the Spring Showcase, which replaced the usual Spring Football game, the Cards had already seen star defensive end Jon Greeenard, backup QB Jordan Travis, RB Trey Smith, and defensive lineman Kam Jones head for greener pastures after making a decision that staying at Louisville was no longer in their best interest.

Many of those moves, including Travis and Greenard, were expected but still hurt the roster to a certain extent but nothing screamed out that there was a problem. However, since then more players have transferred, several more, including multiple expected contributors.

Defensive linemen Allen Love and Michael Boykin, wide receiver’s Corey Reed, Marcus Riley, and Jatavious Harris, and offensive lineman Wyatt Smock all have left the team suddenly over the past 7 days, raising a lot of red flags among Louisville fans. While most understood that these players were likely leaving because of concerns over playing time and roles moving forward, there was some unrest about the potential “culture change” happening behind the scenes. Many were willing to let the moves slide without much question of the new staff, but with today’s news things may be changing for the worse.

Mark Ennis, host of Louisville radio show “The Drive” on 93.9 The Ville, who announced the news of both Jordan Travis and Russ Yeast leaving the team last year, dropped a bombshell on Twitter this morning when he tweeted that RS sophomore Colin Wilson had entered the transfer portal.

Colin Wilson was a former four star recruit by the previous regime who came into the program with a lot of potential and star power. He played in just a few games his freshman season before suffering a knee injury, thus redshirting, but came back last year looking like he could take over the starting role.

Wilson didn’t see the field much until the back half of the season where he rushed for 42 yards and 44 yards against Syracuse and NC State respectively. While those numbers don’t really pop out as being worth calling a player a breakout player, it came during Louisville’s fall from grace in which they lost games by 40-50 points. Wilson finished with 208 yards and one touchdown on the year. Not great, but at least you saw progress.

But when Scott Satterfield was brought in as the new coach, the first player many fans thought of who would benefit was Colin Wilson. In a run happy offense where multiple backs are utilized, the natural skill and ability of Wilson was likely to shine, until it wasn’t.

Wilson will leave Louisville after two years on campus, and will have three years remaining after sitting out this season (unless he gets a waiver) per NCAA transfer rules.

The Cards still have plenty of talent in the backfield, but the bigger question remains for fans; What is happening? Why are players all of a sudden leaving in masses?

You could argue that even Wilson fits the description of a backup and potential contributor but we can’t sit back and act like this isn’t some type of problem. Again, there’s always going to be issues with new coaching staffs and players not wanting to follow the rules but it takes two to tango.

For now as fans we have to sit back and trust the coaching staff to figure it out, as they are being forced to clean up a bad mess that they didn’t’ make.

Losing Wilson will hurt but it will give guys like Hassan Hall, Dae Williams, Javian Hawkins, Tobias Little, and incoming freshman Jalen Mitchell a chance to prove they are the right guys for the job.

Stay tuned folks, it could get worse before it gets better but I advise you not to lose faith in the staff before they even get started.